Hello and welcome to this follow-on track answering the question,
What is NLP?
And it really is a question.
If you were to ask 50 different people that actually have learned NLP the very same question you would get 50 different answers.
NLP is such a big subject with so many amazing applications and it's backed by science and serious study.
So to try and encapsulate that in a couple of sentences is really a bit of a stretch.
However it is also simple,
Effective and very practical and the best way to answer the question is in a simple effective and practical way.
So I'm going to give you my plain English,
No jargon,
Everyday relevant take on NLP and basically what it is.
So number one as I may have mentioned before NLP stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming.
Yep I know it tells you nothing but when you strip it down you can get some clues.
The neuro part is all about how you think,
What your ways of thinking are and if they're useful or not.
The second is linguistic which means the words you use and how you react to the things others say to you and you to them and also how you speak to yourself and then finally programming.
Just like a computer you have set ways of reacting to the stuff that goes on in your life which is sometimes useful and sometimes not so useful.
So it's all about how you think,
How you speak and how you behave and that's pretty interesting stuff to know.
What's even more interesting is knowing what's going on and how,
What's going on and when you think in certain ways and why do you use the words you use and how is it that you react and behave in the way that you do.
Now that's really interesting.
What about knowing how to change the ways you think,
Speak and behave when they're not useful for ways that are.
Now that's really interesting.
So now for the no jargon science.
Amazingly we are only aware of less than 10% of what is actually going on around us and even less than that's available to us at any moment in time to put into our conscious memory.
We have five senses that give us every bit of information about what's going on out there.
We can only pay attention to a little bit of what our senses tell us or we would go mad being overwhelmed by information and there are thousands of processes going on in our brain and body that we will never be aware of.
So what's looking after all that stuff that we're not conscious of?
It's our very clever servant the unconscious mind.
How do we know this?
Psychology and neuroscience have revealed much of what we know about the mechanics and what's this got to do with NLP?
So without getting too deep because I've already got a history of NLP track that you can refer to,
There were a couple of psychologists Richard Bandler,
Frank Pusilich and a professor of linguistics John Grinder who started the constantly evolving discipline of NLP back in 1970 and it's because they were curious about how certain high-profile therapists were so much more successful than anyone else and for the next ten years they observed not only what those therapists did but how they did it and how they thought about what they did.
They were looking for the difference that makes the difference and it turns out that naturally very successful people think in any field,
Think,
Speak and behave differently to everyone else.
Years of study revealed that the unconscious mind plays a huge part in their thought,
Language and behavior patterns and that these could be stripped down into easy to copy processes.
Knowing how your unconscious mind works is like learning how the engine of your car works and when you tinker with the engine you can make changes so that it works better.
If the car is your life then your unconscious mind is the engine and you can make changes to the way you think and behave to run your life better.
It's powerful stuff but really simple and knowing just a little will get you big results,
Just like knowing something as little as how to change the engine oil will give you a better running car.
So that's it NLP.
In my mind the most powerful knowledge available to make your life the way you want it.
It's based on science and robust study.
It's been growing and evolving over the past 50 years.
The body of knowledge that is NLP today is still finding new ways to help people live better lives all over the world.
It's used ever-increasingly in the field of mental health and in treating PTSD.
Sports science has been using it for decades and it's firmly rooted in every leadership and communication course ever written.
It's hidden in there and you can't see it.
So thank you for joining me on this second take on what is NLP,
Another little chocolate chunk for you to enjoy and as always much love.
